Drones have found their place in the sky, from quad-copters buzzing around neighborhoods to military UAVs tracking targets overseas.

San Diego start-up Ocean Aero is aiming for drones also to find their place in the sea.

The company makes the Submaran, an electric and wind powered unmanned ocean vehicle designed to travel both above and below the surface for months at a time.

On Tuesday, the Submaran was among the eight winners of the 28th annual Connect Most Innovative New Products Awards for 2015.

Connect, a non-profit San Diego education and mentoring organization for start-ups, handed out the Most Innovative Products awards this week in categories ranging from Cleantech to Communications, Software to Sports/Active Lifestyle.

“San Diego’s innovation economy is driven by hardworking companies who, day after day, continue to change the way the world operates,” said Greg McKee, chief executive of Connect.

Ocean Aero, founded about two years ago, has built its 14-foot Submaran to serve the academic research, energy and government markets. The 20-employee company has raised just about $5 million to date, said Chief Executive Eric Patten, a retired Navy Captain.

The Submaran uses a wing sail on the surface. In bad weather or to take measurements, the wing folds up, the body is flooded and the craft becomes a submarine. It runs underwater on batteries, which are recharged via solar panels upon resurfacing.

“We are the only people in the world who do a surface and sub-surface vehicle all in one,” said Patten. “We are constructively disruptive in this market.”

Another drone – Northrop Grumman’s RQ-4 Global Hawk – won Connect’s William W. Otterson Award for long-term technology that has impacted society. The Global Hawk is a high-altitude intelligence gathering drone that was partly developed at Northrop Grumman’s Rancho Bernardo location.

Other Most Innovative Product winners include:

VOIP Armor from Mushroom Networks in the Communications and Information Technology category. The voice over Internet protocol gateway device automatically works around network problems that can degrade phone calls.

Hush Smart Earplugs in the Sports/Active Lifestyle category. Hush combines a sound machine, earplugs and smartphone connectivity to help people sleep in noisy environments.

CureMetrix in the Life Science Diagnostics category. The company’s platform analyzes anomalies in medical imaging results. Its first target is early detection of breast cancer and a reduction in unnecessary biopsies.